Reagan: Way Cleared To Arms Deal

August 27, 1987|By George de Lama, Chicago Tribune. Tribune correspondent Alice Siegert contributed to this report from Bonn.

LOS ANGELES — President Reagan hailed West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl`s offer Wednesday to dismantle 72 aging Pershing 1A missiles as a new arms control breakthrough, and he challenged the Soviet Union to take more steps to reduce world tensions.

In a speech praising Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev`s internal reforms while attacking the Soviet communist system, Reagan said an agreement to eliminate short- and medium-range missiles from Europe and Asia now could be concluded promptly.

Reagan said Kohl`s offer Wednesday to dismantle the Pershings removed an

``artificial obstacle`` to a U.S.-Soviet accord to eliminate all intermediate nuclear force missiles.

``We can wrap up an agreement on intermediate-range nuclear missiles promptly,`` Reagan said in a speech before the Town Hall of California that was carried live via satellite to a conference of U.S. and Soviet foreign policy experts in Chautauqua, N.Y.

A senior White House official who briefed reporters said Kohl`s decision and a new U.S. verification proposal submitted to Soviet arms negotiators on Tuesday could provide the decisive impetus for a formal medium-range missile agreement and a third Reagan-Gorbachev summit in fall.

``I think the way (to an accord) has been smoothed considerably,`` the official said. ``This looks very promising at this point.``

The official said Reagan and Kohl exchanged written messages Tuesday, but he insisted that the U.S. applied ``absolutely no pressure`` on Bonn to scrap the Pershings, which by their presence in Europe had blocked progress to a medium-range missile deal.

After consulting with Reagan, Kohl announced Wednesday that West Germany would dismantle the Pershings if Washington and Moscow reach a ``signed and completed`` agreement to eliminate all medium-range missiles by the end of the year.

In Moscow, the Soviet media said initially that Kohl`s offer was hedged with conditions, but later reports called it ``a step forward.``

White House officials expressed confidence that the Soviet Union ultimately would accept Kohl`s offer as a way to break the U.S.-Soviet deadlock over the Pershings. The weapons are owned by West Germany but the U.S. controls their nuclear warheads.

The Soviets have insisted that the Pershings be included in U.S.-Soviet arms talks in Geneva. But the U.S. has refused because it claims the weapons are Germany`s.

Despite his optimism over an arms control agreement, Reagan stressed in his speech that Moscow also must institute greater internal reforms and moderate its policies worldwide if it is to forge an improvement in U.S relations.

Reagan challenged Gorbachev to extend his glasnost policy of openness to Soviet military affairs by publishing the size of the Soviet military budget and making public the internal Kremlin debate over military policies and weapons systems.

Reagan also urged the Soviet Union to stop supporting leftist revolution in Central America, withdraw troops from Afghanistan and allow self-determination in Eastern Europe as concrete ``guideposts`` for reducing world tensions.

The President`s speech was billed by White House aides as a major foreign policy address expressing Reagan`s hope for a new era in peaceful cooperation between the superpowers.

Reagan appealed for U.S.-Soviet cooperation in helping end the Iran-Iraq war and praised the Soviet leadership for what appeared to be a new willingness to ``address the problems that have divided East and West so long and to seek agreements based on mutual benefit.``

But he also restated his long-held views of the Soviet Union as a dangerous enemy of world freedom that lacks the moral legitimacy of the Western democracies.

``We refuse to believe that it was somehow an act of belligerence to proclaim publicly the crucial moral distinctions between democracy and totalitarianism,`` Reagan said.

The President said he was encouraged by Gorbachev`s policy of internal reforms but emphasized that the campaign to reduce secrecy in Soviet society and decentralize the economy did not go far enough.

``While we acknowledge the interesting changes in the Soviet Union, we know, too, that any Western standard for democracy is still a very distant one for the Soviets,`` Reagan said. ``We know what real democracy constitutes; we understand its implications.

``It means the rule of law for leaders as well as the people. It involves limitations on the power of the state over the people. It means orderly debate and meaningful votes. It means liberation of the captive peoples from the thrall of a ruling elite that presumes to know the people`s good better than the people.``

Reagan also said that despite glasnost, Soviet foreign policy remains aggressive and expansionist.

``While talking about reforms at home, the Soviet Union has stepped up its efforts to impose a failed system on others,`` Reagan said. ``Soviet action in these areas (is) being viewed with the utmost concern. I cannot overemphasize this point.``